You can click on new tool to check smog

Map offers real-time information on air risks

Houstonians can see whether smog levels are harmful at their schools, soccer fields and homes in real time with a new tool unveiled Monday by the University of Houston and two public health groups.

The searchable map allows users to identify ozone, or smog, levels at specific locations and track where the lung-burning air pollution is moving in the region.

The Houston Clean Air Network map is thought to be the first of its kind.

Smog levels at various air pollution monitors now can be found on government websites, but the data typically is more than an hour old, said Matthew Tejada, executive director of Air Alliance Houston, one of the groups involved in the project.

Smog is created when sunlight cooks a mixture of chemicals emitted mostly by tailpipes and smokestacks. Chronic exposure to ozone, the main ingredient in smog, can cause asthma attacks, chest pain and premature death.

The car-dependent and heavily industrialized Houston region is one of the smoggiest areas in the nation, with an ozone season that stretches from March to November.

The University of Houston, Air Alliance Houston and American Lung Association are using real-time data from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality for the searchable map. The project is funded through a three-year, $442,000 grant by the Houston Endowment.

The commission's own map is updated hourly and sometimes after smog has reached harmful levels. On Monday, for example, the state agency issued an advisory for unhealthy ozone levels in Clear Lake at about 3 p.m., more than two hours after the new tool identified the problem.

"TCEQ has been very generous" by sharing data from its monitors, Tejada said. "This is made possible because they understand the power of having this information available to people."

Not bound by borders

Other maps, such as the one produced by the South Coast Air Quality Management District in California, show hourly ozone levels by larger geographical areas, not addresses.

That approach falls short because smog ignores city and county lines and can be worse in one part of a region and not another on the same day, said Barry Lefer, an earth and atmospheric scientist at UH, who was part of the team that developed the tool.

Lefer said he is hopeful people will use the map at houstoncleanairnetwork.com to help them with decisions about when and where to go outside.

The next step, he said, will be to develop an app for the iPhone, allowing parents, coaches and others on the go to monitor smog levels as if they were checking for lightning and rain.

Eventually, Lefer said the project team would like to use the network for epidemiological studies. Researchers, for example, could track how exposure to the pollutant affects the performance of runners and bicyclists.

Raising awareness

The key, however, will be getting people to use it.

Rodney Chant, for one, said he does not often look at smog levels as athletics director for the Pasadena Independent School District. His head trainer, however, does monitor athletes with asthma on days with ozone advisories and has not seen any ill effects from the pollution.

Tejada is hopeful the new tool will raise public awareness about smog.

"There is a real lack of publicity and sincerity about the impact of smog on public health," he said. "I really hope a resource like this will help us to deal with air quality in Houston."